Christine writes:
<Mother called stating that her pumped milk has an appearance that is
clearer than skim milk. After it has been standing a layer of fat is
evident but not as much as in the past.>

This sounds more like an artifact of the length of the time period before
those pumpings than a phenomenon of secretion changes. My first question
would be "When is this mother pumping? At work, in place of a feeding?
Has there been any change in the length of time she goes between
pumpings? Or has she ever tried to pump shortly after a feeding, when
what milk she could get out would be much higher fat content?"

The baby, being more efficient at milk transfer than the pump, is
probably removing hindmilk much more thoroughly than any pump, leading to
the contentment and continued adequate calorie intake.

The more well-drained the breast, the higher the fat content. In addition
to all the other reasons given in past discussions on LN, which I am not
disagreeing with, there is also the fact that in its natural state, cream
rises (away from gravity). If mother is going a long time without any
strong MER's (busy and distracted at work and not pumping till the lunch
hour, etc.), especially if she is pumping one side at a time, the first
milk pumped on the first side would appear thinner because it has not had
a chance to show the "mix" that eventually results after several strong
MER's

Each MER would propel forward not only the most recently secreted fat
globules collected in the lobules behind the ductules between MER's, but
also the cream that was left over from the previous feedings that had
risen back upward into the segmental ducts during longer intervals
between feedings/pumpings/MER's.

I have no real knowledge of whether her contraceptive could alter the
activity of an alveolar cell in regard to the % of fat, protein,
carbohydrates and liquids it would secrete, but I doubt it. The time
sequence between MER's and the length of time from the previous
feeding/pumping sounds like a more likely explanation to me.

Jean
************
K. Jean Cotterman RNC, IBCLC
Dayton, Ohio USA

             ***********************************************

To temporarily stop your subscription: set lactnet nomail
To start it again: set lactnet mail (or digest)
To unsubscribe: unsubscribe lactnet
All commands go to [log in to unmask]

The LACTNET mailing list is powered by L-Soft's renowned
LISTSERV(R) list management software together with L-Soft's LSMTP(TM)
mailer for lightning fast mail delivery. For more information, go to:
http://www.lsoft.com/LISTSERV-powered.html